Julia Grant Returns to Washington
Former First Lady Tires of New York City
By 1895, Julia Boggs Grant, the widow of President Ulysses S. Grant, had grown tired of living in New York City. After leaving Washington in 1877 under a cloud of scandals that marked her husband’s administration, Julia had hoped that the dust had settled enough for a return to Washington.
The return to Washington was a practical move for Julia Grant. Along with many of her lifelong friends, she also had a considerable amount of family in town: a son, a daughter, and two sisters.
Julia’s divorced daughter, Ellen “Nellie,” who married Englishman Algernon Sartoris in an elaborate White House ceremony in 1874 that was billed as one of the greatest American social events of the 19th century, had returned to Washington the year before her mother and was living in the Dupont Circle neighborhood.
